Precious Materials
Latinum featured in many episodes of Deep Space Nine as a medium of exchange used by Ferengis and others. It was a liquid usually traded as "gold-pressed latinum"; once the latinum was extracted, the gold was discarded. It is useful as a medium of exchange because it is impossible to replicate.
Tholian silk was a valuable fabric mentioned in multiple series.
Bio-mimetic gel is a volatile substance with medical applications. It is also highly sought after for use in illegal activities, such as genetic experimentation and biological weapons development. As such, its use is strictly regulated by the United Federation of Planets, and sale of the substance is prohibited. The substance was first mentioned in an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation, and was used as a plot element in several episodes of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.
Read more about this topic: List Of Star Trek Materials
Famous quotes containing the words precious and/or materials:
“It is by the goodness of God that in our country we have those three unspeakably precious things: freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and the prudence never to practice either of them.”
—Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835–1910)
“In how few words, for instance, the Greeks would have told the story of Abelard and Heloise, making but a sentence of our classical dictionary.... We moderns, on the other hand, collect only the raw materials of biography and history, “memoirs to serve for a history,” which is but materials to serve for a mythology.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)